By Michael C. Mack

1. What popular person, if he or she were coming to your town, would you go to see? If obstacles prevented you from seeing that person, how hard would you work to overcome those obstacles?

Read Luke 19:1-10.

2. What kind of reputation did Zacchaeus have and how did people probably treat him? How did Jesus treat him?

3. In what ways did Zacchaeus become like a little child as he tried to see Jesus (v. 4)?

4. Zacchaeus had a whatever-it-takes attitude toward seeking Jesus. How can that be a model for you in your pursuit of Jesus?

5. There will always be critics when we love lavishly and reach out to those who seem like the most unlikely to come to Jesus. Is there someone you sense you need to talk to—perhaps at work, in your neighborhood, or somewhere “good Christians aren’t supposed to go”—but in order to do so you’ll need to ignore the critics? Who is it? What would people criticize?

6. Jesus transformed Zacchaeus’s life. In his response, we see repentance, restitution to those he had cheated, and reconciliation with God. Zacchaeus was made right with God and so he made things right with other people. With whom or in what ways do you need to make things right in response to what God has done for you? How will you do that this week?

Michael C. Mack leads church training events and consults with churches through his ministry, Small Group Leadership (www.smallgroupleadership.com).